Day One - Part 2

[Doomguy]

There's not a lot you can say about rations that hasn't been said a thousand times before. Well, you could say they're good, that would be unique. it would also be a damn lie. It was only through an experience of eight years, give or take a few months worth of leave and "special occasions", that I managed to taken in the bland lumpy slurry with little in the way of either grossed reflexes or unhappy comments. One bland meal is the same as every other one. The only real solace I could garner in that moment was that, at that very moment, some if not most of the primes had the same meal as I did and those that learned their first taste of an MRE, particularly those prim and proper ones who lived a life of luxery, now suffered how I once did. Yes, its wrong to enjoy the suffering of others, but it was the only thing that put a smile on my face as I ate that chili breakfast. Meals Rarely Edible make sadist out of anyone. I packed up what I didn't use for future use and went back to over-watch.

The long stretch of time that I waited for either a new moon to rise or one of the victory-sighted primes to cross my line of sight eroded my will to keep my eyes open. I drooped occasionally into sleep, my armed tightly holding onto my weapon, only to be jolted back by honed reflexes by either the subtle crackle of disturbed grass or the wind through leaves. Or the blared announcements of that shit-eating Karl Jak, who more and more I imagined that I would place mt hands around his neck and strangle the life out of him with each of his calls, the heartless jackal lauded each death and additional hazard. In this method I manged to get about a three hours of rest in the twelve hour span that I held my ground against the loomed yet never arrived threat. Once the contestants had been thinned, then I could get some sleep. Sets of twenty winks was bad enough.

The last attempt at rest was not ended by something inconspicuous or Jak's blatant ego masturbation, but tiny droplets hitting the few spots of exposed flesh on me. Rain. While the brief moments of pitter-patter on my skin felt good to this southern born soldier, it quickly turned from spring showers to the sheets most know and hate. the kind people like to see from the inside of a building, less when you're stuck in it. the tree I was under offered little protection, and clouds seemed to have spawned under the domes that the audience watched from. The only rain I've had to deal with in the USSMC was the acid rain of Venus, deadly as it was dense; but still thought of those who have not had to fight in the rain, unable to see farther than a few yards while you watched for the enemy. How many of the primes had been in these conditions, or had even killed before. I felt sorry for them, as they had to sacrifice their innocence for whatever goal that compelled them to join this hellhole. I would have tried to had to keep them safe from these horrors, and now I had perpetuated it.

But it was for the mission. This short suffering would be compensated. That's what I told myself.

As I kept myself seated under the torrent of rain, Karl was on the mic again. I gave the sky above me the middle finger as he shouted out where the head popping areas were next, but I stopped when I heard what he said next. Hurricane. Winds that could rip trees from the ground, rain as thing as fog, and the shores swallowing up the land in heaves and waves until there was nothing left. On a smile island like this, the only safe spot would be the high ground, and if I sat there I would be up to my chest in shark infested rapids. My hand was forced, and I couldn't help but frown that I was giving up my tactical advantage. No matter, I had a plan, and I would stick to it. the march would be long and perilous, but I was ready. That's what I told myself.